EUGENE, Ore. — The Eugene Police Department is giving its records and dispatch system a cutting-edge makeover. EPD is the first in the state to use the program, Sunguard, and will start testing the system this week.

The advanced update fully integrates every system in the department including dispatch, mobile and records. That allows the department to share with other agencies more efficiently and officers will have access to more information in the field. The system is also paperless, which links data quickly.

“With link analysis it will tie things together. It will grab offender information and maybe tie it to a vehicle or tie it to some other incident that happened, which will then link to another person. So really using link analysis, investigators will be able to solve crime,” says project manager Loring Hummel.

The system also analyzes criminal activity information to forecast where additional crimes are likely to occur. The system’s map-based satellite vehicle location will allow dispatchers to choose the correct police and fire units to respond to incidents.

Sunguard is also very cost-effective. EPD pays about $1 million to operate its current system and the new system will cost less than half the price. The department expects to fully roll it out before the end of the year.

Bigjim says:

I’m all for cutting edge technology when it comes to our police and fire departments. As a member of the Veneta community, I have been involved in several situations where i’ve needed to call police dispatch for disturbances and drug related issues. Moments after placing the call to dispatch everyone flees the scene. After discussing this with LCS I was informed that many people living on the wrong side of the law are running scanner apps on their cell phones. So not only do the criminals know that there was a call place against them, they also know in most cases where that call came from. Which typically leaves the honest citizen trying to gain peace in their neighborhood at risk of harassment or worse. Hope the new system deals with this issue.